Deroy Murdock: Would you trust this President to lead us into war?

Can a possibly war-bound USA survive the unbearable lightness of being Obama? As Americans debate potential military intervention in Syria, the true grit of our fighting men and women is unquestioned. But their hesitant and erratic commander-in-chief renders worrisome the notion of attacking Damascus.

On Wednesday, for instance, Obama declared: "I didn't set a red line. The world set a red line."

In fact, on Aug. 20, 2012, Obama said, "We have been very clear to the Assad regime…that a red line for us is, we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized."

Obama installed the trip wire for war with Syria. Now, on the brink of combat, he disowns it.

On Aug. 30, Obama had an uncharacteristically bellicose Secretary of State John Kerry virtually announce that 'bombing begins in five minutes.' One day later, Obama virtually announced that 'debate begins in five minutes.' Obama said he wanted Congress to permit hostilities. But rather than summon lawmakers to Washington, Obama let Congress' summer vacation rage on.

Still, Obama could have spent the rest of Aug. 31 lobbying legislators. Such a photo would have signaled his single-mindedness and steely resolve. Instead, Obama played his 141st round of golf as President.

Such unseriousness seems to be the Obama Doctrine's active ingredient. Consider:

• Obama last June authorized the CIA to provide arms to the Free Syrian Army. "As of right now, they haven't received one weapon from the United States," Sen. John McCain, R–Ariz., lamented. "Reports are that the United States has constrained other countries from giving them the kinds of things they need."

• Last September, Obama met with precisely zero heads of state at the U.N. General Assembly, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who virtually begged to see his American counterpart. However, Obama did find time to be "eye candy" (in Whoppi Goldberg's words) on The View.

"Most people were like down in the Situation Room and (the President) was like, 'I'm not going to be down there, I can't watch this entire thing,'" Love said. "So," referring to Obama, himself, and two other staffers, "we must have played 15 hands, 15 games of spades."

That's right. As Seal Team Six intrepidly pursued the man behind the Sept. 11, 2001 slaughter, their commander-in-chief played cards.

• According to a conservative watchdog group called the Government Accountability Institute, Obama skipped 58 percent of his presidential daily briefs between his first inaugural and last March 31. During the entire week before last Sept. 11's massacre in Benghazi, Libya, Obama missed these interactive sessions with top intelligence personnel.

Unforgivably, Obama blew off his PDBs for three days after al-Qaida-affiliated Islamic terrorists killed four U.S. public servants in Benghazi. Obama finally sat down for a full PDB on Sept. 14, 2012 — his first such face-to-face huddle in nine days.

• After al-Qaida-trained crotch bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to detonate 279 passengers and 11 crew members aboard a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines jet on Christmas Day 2009, Obama should have spoken on camera to reassure rattled Americans and remind terrorists of U.S. strength. Instead, he failed to interrupt his Hawaiian vacation and did not even appear publicly for three days. Meanwhile, the National Counterterrorism Center's then-director Michael Leiter left Dec. 26 for a six-day family ski trip.

Back to Syria, Obama's policy seems to be to strike — but not for long, and not hard enough to topple Assad, even though Kerry compares him to Hitler. Under the War Powers Act, Obama could bomb Syria for 60 days without congressional approval. And yet Obama seeks Congress' permission to strike. But if that fails, he may smack Syria anyway.

Huh?

Amid epic chaos, Obama instills no confidence. This helps explain why so many Americans are reluctant to march to the wavering beat of this unsteady drummer.

Deroy Murdock is a Fox News contributor, a nationally syndicated columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service, and a media fellow with the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University.